Family quit the mystery house
By Mirror reporter
A town’s housingcommittee will decide on Wednesday what to do about the House of Mystery. The house – at New Cross road, Stamford, Lincs – has been empty for three weeks. The last tenants, Herbert Taylor, 58, and his wife, Grace, 56, were moved to another house in the road after they complained of the “atmosphere.” The Taylors had lived at the thirty-year-old house for five years before they felt something was wrong. Then, two years ago, their son, Martin – now twenty-five – heard “bumps in the night.” After that came the “atmosphere”… and a nasty smell which Mrs Taylor says she cannot describe.
“My eyes began to run and my nose and mouth went dry,” she told me yesterday. “I was left with a horrible taste in my mouth and an aching throat. AND I HEARD THE BUMPS.”
Councillor Bernard Burney, former Indian Army oficer, went to the house to investigate. In less than five minutes, he said, his cheeks went cold, his eyes wept and his mouth went dry. “It was several hours after leaving the house before I felt right again,” he said yesterday.
The council’s property maintenance officer, Mr Tom Hutson, visited the house and said it was like being in a mock gas-attack. “I felt my face prickle,” he said. The gas board tested for leaks – and found nothing. The council took up floorboards… probed the chimneys… and found nothing. Nothing to explain the “atmosphere.” So on Wednesday, teh housing committee will decide whether or not to re-let the House of Mystery.
Daily Mirror, 2nd October 1961.
Ghosts? Don’t be daft – says a Mother.
A House of Mystery which drove its tenants out with bumps in the night, an “atmosphere” and smells, has been re-let to a couple with five children. Mr Herbert Taylor, 58, and his wife, Grace, 56, had their removal costs paid by the council when they left the house in New Cross-road, Stamford, Lincs, a month ago. They had occupied it for seven years. The council’s new tenants, who have been living in a smaller house across the road, are Mr Eric Lenton, 34, his wife Margaret, 42, and their three girls and two boys, aged eight months to eighteen years.
As she scrubbed floorboards in the House of Mystery yesterday, Mrs Lenton said: “We don’t believe in ghosts, and by the time I’ve finished scrubbing there won’t be any smells, although I haven’t noticed any.” Mrs Lenton added that since she got the tenancy many people have stopped her in the street to say: “Surely you’re not going in THAT house with your children.” She told them not to be daft.
Daily Mirror, 9th October 1961.